A dog survived being stuck in an underground pipe for five days by drinking water from its filter.

Operation: Jess the Jack Russell after her rescue (Pictures: Caters)

Jess had become trapped in the 23cm-wide (nine-inch) drainage tunnel after chasing a rat while on a walk.

Her head was wedged next to a sump filter filled with water, which the Jack Russell drank to survive.

The eight-year-old was then found in an operation that involved firefighters, the RSPCA, a rescue team and villagers.

Owner Chris Lancaster, whose husband Shaun died ten years ago in an explosion while smoking rats out of a field, said: âI hate rats now â itâs so strange that they were the reason I lost Shaun and now the reason that I almost lost Jess.

âShe often chases rats and this day she saw one and ran after it. We waited around for a couple of hours for her to come out but she didnât.

âI called the fire brigade and they came with heat-sensing equipment and cameras on long poles.

âLots of people in the village asked if they could help dig but the pipe stretched for so long that we didnât know where to start.â

Jess was eventually found after rescuers began digging at a new point in the field.

âShe lost a hell of a lot of weight. She had no skin on her elbows where she had wriggled down the hole,â added Mrs Lancaster, of Aldbrough, East Yorkshire.

âItâs a good thing she had got stuck in the sump It saved her life.â